You're Gonna Wanna Go to Lackawanna....for meatballs

Living in the south, I've struggled to find good Italian food.  When I lived back north, great Italian places were on nearly every block.  I was spoiled when I lived in North Buffalo, which is the section of the city where Italian immigrants settled.  There were great little Italian places, so it was a luxury to have to pick and choose.  So when I travel back to my hometown for a weekend, Italian food is usually in the mix of my self-induced 72 hour food coma.

Back in Raleigh, one night while watching TV, MM and I flipped over to Food Network and all we see is a huge piece of lasagna and a huge meatball at the Mulberry Italian Ristorante.  Our mouths watered instantly.  Where in this great country could we get this lasagna and meatball?  We hit the info button on the TV, and it simply says New York.  We assume that it's somewhere downstate near New York City (sidebar: Buffalo is not close to NYC - about 8 hours...I lived closer to the City when I lived in Virginia.)  When I pull up the website to get the address, I'm amazed.  It's in Lackawanna, NY.  LACKAWANNA?

Lackawanna, NY is an immediate southern suburb of Buffalo, which is a blue-collar town with a Ford plant and old steel mills, so hearing there is a culinary gem in there is quite surprising. The restaurant opened back in 2005 and changed to an Italian format a year later. So on my most recent trip back home, I was tasked with choosing where to go for family dinner.  No question - I needed to try this place.  Fortunately, my family had dined here before, but was limited on the menu since it was lent (no meat), so they were as excited as me.

We navigate through a quaint neighborhood that runs up against one of the old steel mills (coincidentally, one of my good friends grew up in that neighborhood) and we find Mulberry -  a little corner restaurant with a black awning.  We head in and the restaurant is long and narrow, with some old Yankee Stadium chairs as a waiting area.  The walls are painted a deep red, covered in pictures of the Rat Pack, New York City, and New York and Buffalo sports memorabilia.

The menu has an ample selection of Italian favorites - pasta, chicken, eggplant.  The lasagna is their speciality - the beautiful thing about it is that it changes daily.  The night we were in there, it was a 3 meat lasagna, made with beef, shredded pork and italian sausage.  My sister and her fiancee were both set on getting that, so I knew I could snatch a bite of the house specialty. But I wanted the other house specialty - the meatball.  

The meatball comes with select entrees or can be an appetizer.  Right - one meatball as an appetizer.  So I choose for my entree the Gnocchi di Ricotta Fatto in Casa - homemade ricotta filled gnocchi, which comes with the meatball.  The soup of the day is a Banana Pepper Bisque, which sounds amazing, so I have to partake in that as well.

The soup had more heat than I was expecting, but it is served with a piece of fresh bread, that helped cut the heat.  Super creamy and super flavorful.  But this still did not prepare me for my entree....when it arrives, I'm amazed at the size of the meatball.  It's the size of my fist!

The meatball is huge and packed with great flavor.  But the gnocchi was easily the best I've ever had.  Usually gnocchi is rather dense, but each dumpling was so light and the ricotta was so incredibly fresh.  Simply to die for.  I flew back to Raleigh the next day, and brought my leftovers home with me so MM (who is Sicilian and picky on his Italian) could try, and I received these two texts:

"I had the gnocchi.  Oh Dear."

"That meatball is not fair."

My sister and her fiancee get the full size portion lasagna (mainly so he could have leftover lasagna for lunch the next day...), and blown away at the size - a full size portion is easily 3-4 portions anywhere else.

I'm not a huge meat lasagna fan, but I really enjoyed this, especially the shredded pork inside, since it's a texture not usually seen in lasagnas.  The cheese again was so light and fluffy that this didn't seem like a weight in your stomach. My sister barely put a dent in this, much to the delight of her fiancee, since he was the benefactor of lunch the second day.

I did save room for dessert, since my sister's fiancee talked about the cannolis all weekend.  The standard cannoli has a citrus ricotta filling, but I opted for the nutella cannoli, topped with pistachios.  Simply heavenly.    When you reach the bottom of your dessert plate (after you've licked it clean), the proprietors' humor comes out with a message on the plate.

The only big mistake with Mulberry is that I hadn't been there sooner.  MM is already planning his trip back home to drive to Lackawanna.  There was a jingle back in the 80's for (from what I can remember) a furniture store that said "you're gonna wanna come to Lackawanna....", and you definitely will want to come again and again for an amazing meal.

Mulberry Italian Ristorante

64 Jackson Street

Lackawanna NY 14218

www.worldfamouslasagna.com

Buffalo Cupcakes? Really?

I love to cook, but I've never been a big baker, probably because I'm not a huge sweets lover. I would much rather have a plate of cheeses for dessert than a triple layer chocolate cake.  When I make a trip to my local cupcake shop, I usually choose carrot cake, since it's not overly sweet.

A couple weeks ago before the super bowl, a friend tweeted me a recipe for buffalo chicken wing cupcakes, since she enjoys my Required Chicken Wing Dip (which was required for her baby shower...).  At first I was scared by the concept, but wanted to see how this would turn out.  The recipe called for full sized cupcakes with a huge chicken wing placed on top, but I'm a functional eater - I'm not going to eat a cupcake where I have to take something off to eat.  Also, I thought these would be better as a mini cupcake, given it's not your typical cupcake, as well as being the perfect size for a party. 

While not a typical cupcake, they are quite delicious.  It's like a spicy cornbread.  The cake itself holds some heat from the 1/2 cup of hot sauce (which I had used wing sauce, which had already been cut once with butter), so you can tweak the amount of hot sauce to your liking.   The blue cheese buttercream frosting helps balance the heat, so you get that sweet and savory mix.  Since there is no chicken in them, my vegetarian friends can enjoy the taste of chicken wings without the meat, which is why I took "chicken wing" out of the name of my recipe.

I took these to a super bowl party, and bite size was definitely the way to go, since everyone had the same reaction...."Buffalo Cupcakes?   Really?" Really.  And delicious. 

Buffalo Cupcakes 

Makes 36 mini cupcakes

Cake:

• 1/2 cup hot sauce or chicken wing sauce (Frank's Red Hot) - cut the amount of hot sauce to your liking.
• 1/4 cup unsalted butter
• 1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons sour cream
• 1 egg
• 1 cup flour
• 1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda

Preheat oven to 350 F. In a medium-sized saucepan on medium-high heat, heat hot sauce and butter until butter is melted. Add the blue cheese and mix periodically until blue cheese is melted. Remove from heat and mix in the sugar. In a small bowl, whisk together the sour cream and egg.  Once the hot sauce mixture is cool enough to touch, mix the sour cream mixture into the hot sauce mixture. In another small bowl, mix together the flour and baking soda. Fold the flour mixture into the hot sauce mixture. Fill cupcake liners 3/4 full, and bake for 20 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Blue Cheese Buttercream Frosting:

• 2 ounces crumbled blue cheese
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
• 2 cups powdered sugar

Mix blue cheese on high speed until smooth. Add the unsalted butter and mix on high speed until light and fluffy (about 3 minutes). Slowly mix in the powdered sugar until fully combined. Pipe or spread onto cooled cupcakes.

Zillycakes & Blue Monk Buffalo 10-15-11

When I travel back to Buffalo, the weekend schedule is usually trying to cram all my favorite hometown foods and specialties into a 72 hour span - Mighty Taco, A Royal from Penora's, Pizza & Wings from anywhere, Beef on Weck are usually the menu (I believe to the chagrin of my mother, who always wants to make me a home cooked meal...)  Since I'm always chasing down the old standbys, I never really get to try new restaurants in the area.


My last trip home, my sister & I went down to the Elmwood Strip,  a 2 mile stretch of Elmwood Avenue, lined with bars and eclectic shops near the Buffalo State College campus.  The day was cold and rainy, so our plan to walk the strip was altered to jump in the car and drive 5 blocks to the next group of stores, but still fun nonetheless to explore.


While we were up at the northern end of the strip, we saw Zillycakes, a specialty cake and cupcake shop. Their main business is designing cakes, but they do have a walk-in cupcake bar.  The walk-in area is TINY - there is a small bar with a couple stools, but is adjacent to the bar, so when someone else walks in, you are cramped.  Fortunately, we had some space when making our selections.


All the cupcakes at the cupcake bar are made to order - you pick your cupcake, your frosting, and if you desire, your toppings.  They had the standard cupcakes - yellow, chocolate, red velvet - but they had special cupcakes - apple almond, and lime thai chile.  Same goes with the frosting - standard buttercreams and cream cheese, but also had apple cider buttercream, which sounded perfect on a fall day, so we went with the apple almond cupcake to complement the apple cider buttercream.  They sprinkled almond slivers a top the cupcake, and was beautifully presented.

The cake was super moist, and frosting had hints of apple and spice, but not overpowering.  The almonds gave it texture.  Definitely a great cupcake.  Since Zilly (the owner, hence the name) was recently on Food Network Halloween Challenge, she may want to think about expanding, because her walk-in business will do the same.


Shopping makes me hungry....and thirsty.  As we continue down Elmwood, we were going to stop somewhere to knock another Buffalo staple off my list, but we ended up near the Blue Monk, a gastropub that opened in 2010.  And being from Buffalo, it's very standard to say "want to get a drink?" at 2pm.  So of course, my arm was twisted and off we got out of the rain.  The windows are tainted dark, so it was hard to see in from across Elmwood Avenue, and we wondered if they were open....oh, they were open, all right.


We walk in and the place is PACKED.  At 2pm.  On a Saturday.  The only place we can grab seats is at the bar near the door, coincidentally where we had sat when I had first come to Blue Monk on a Saturday evening out with my sister earlier in the spring.  We had only come for drinks that evening, but had looked at the menu and was intrigued and wanted to come back.


The restaurant is long and narrow, as most businesses on Elmwood are.  The bar runs along the right side before a staircase takes you upstairs to the dining area.  To the right of the steps is a huge blackboard listing all their beers on tap.  They run approximately 32 beers on tap in a wide variety of craft beers.  I go with a Flying Bison Rusty Chain, a Vienna lager which is locally brewed and only locally distributed.  Great flavor and always have when I'm in town.  Sis goes with a Southern Tier Pumking, a seasonal pumpkin ale which is brewed an hour south of Buffalo in Lakewood, NY, but is distributed regionally.  I had this beer in Raleigh a few weeks earlier, and loved it, so introduced it to my family when I was home, and Kim was hooked.  Balanced pumpkin flavor that doesn't overpower you (hmmm...now I need to go downstairs and crack the growler of it I bought yesterday....)


The menu is gastropub food, highlighted by the Duck Frites - belgian style fries cooked in duck fat, and served with a choice of 2 sauces.  We went with chipotle bacon mayo and wasabi aioli.  Since it was a cold day, soup sounded good, and the soup of the day was a creamy fennel and greens soup with goat cheese crostini.  I love fennel and I love goat cheese, and in soup?  Immediately intrigued.  We each got a bowl.  


The frites were perfectly cooked - slight crunch on the outside, yet soft inside.  The chipotle bacon surprisingly was my favorite of the two sauces we selected - the smokiness of the bacon and the slight heat of the chipotle made for a great sauce.  The wasabi aioli was good, but I didn't think the wasabi was strong enough against the mayo.  


The soup was even better.  Shame on me for not taking a picture of it.  The goat cheese was spread on top of the crostini, and placed on top of the soup.  The soup itself was delicious - hints of fennel and the creamy warmth of the soup made for a perfect fall meal, but once the crostini softened to break up and eat, the soup took new dimension.  The goat cheese heightened the creaminess and the flavor, and was so delicious. I immediately wanted another bowl, but then remembered I had to gorge on other Buffalo delicacies later, so I declined.


We stuck around for another beverage, and this time I went with Three Heads The Kind India Pale Ale from nearby Rochester.  I usually don't drink IPA's because they are too hoppy, but sometimes they can surprise me, as this one did, since it more resembled a Pale Ale, which is my beer style of choice.


Blue Monk is not a place I'd expect in Buffalo.  Buffalo bars are like the city and their people - simple, no frills, and great heart & soul.  This bar seems to be more high end and something I'd see in New York, but given the crowd on a Saturday afternoon, Buffalo embraces it, and so do I.  Next time, I will do a full meal, complemented with an Rusty Chain, of course.

Buffalo Restaurants

As a native Buffalonian, it is so tough to get good wings (or as they call them everywhere else in the U.S., Buffalo Wings), beef on weck, or any of the multitude of WNY goodies we grew up on.  While I am within 4 hours of a Wegmans (and don't think I won't make that pilgrimage...), I'd like to compile a list of Buffalo restaurants throughout the U.S. that will help satisfy those Buffalo culinary urges.  Please let me know if you have any to add - all are welcome! :)

Raleigh, NC:
Buffalo Brothers - 2 locations.  Owned by 2 guys from Batavia - great pizza & wings.  All you can eat wings on Saturday afternoons?  OK then.  Blue cheese, no ranch.
Blinco's - owned by a guy from Lewiston.  He has switched allegiances from the Sabres to the Hurricanes, although I think he still has a soft spot for the blue and gold.  Beef on weck, spiedies, and its own garbage plate (called a Hurricane Plate).  At least it's served with Zweigles dogs and not Brightleaf.

Phoenix, AZ:
Native New Yorker - several locations in PHX area, and now branching out into Washington and Texas.  Going chain on me.

Atlanta, GA
Barker's Red Hots - this was right across the street from my hotel on my last business trip.  I only learned of its Buffalo wonderfulness as someone tried to explain they had beef on "wick" (grrrr.....).  They serve Sahlen's hot dogs, polish sausage, italian sausage, loganberry (marketed as Crystal Beach....awesome), and yes, beef on WECK.  Making sure next time I have to go to Atlanta on work I make sure I get there.

Denver, CO
Big Hoss BBQ - OK...this isn't Buffalo food, but this is great BBQ in the Rockies.  And the owner went to my high school.  And he gave us free shots of whiskey when watching a Bills game.  Shameless plug.

Hilton Head, SC
Lee Wood's - another high school alum bringing Buffalo goodies to the Southeast.  Wings, beef on weck, and the house specialty chicken wing soup.